Yeeha! Finally people are poking their heads out of their holiday holes
and throwing some questions my way. This being a friday, I would normally have a guest host here, but,
since the current guest mysteriously disappeared exactly one week ago, you're stuck with just me. Should
Cyrael appear alive and unharmed, I have handy one of the games he was looking for to throw at him, which
of course would give the guest host throne to me... and of course, if he turns up dead in a gutter, well,
I suppose I'll have to start up a new chain, which again gives me the throne. I don't feel like answering
everything twice today though.

So I don't actually remember you expounding on what you thought of The Lord of the Rings. I've seen it twice so far and I find it... really, damn good. I'll need to see the rest before I make my final judgement. But if they maintain (or exceed), the overall quality of what I saw in the first, it will be very good tribute to the books. And yet it's hard to pick out what is good. The best way I can put it is that it is more than the sum of its parts.

But I'm not here to ask about that. I'm here to ask you, (because I'm too lazy to find out myself), if they are making another Parasite Eve. Ever. I know, I know, you really disliked the last one, but they might change it back (incidentally, I liked both). Just curious. Thanks for your time.

The Wandering God

Googleshng:
I saw the Fellowship of the Ring movie last weekend, and yes, they did do a pretty darn good job with
it. Anyway though, I flat out don't see a PE3 on the horizon. Square decided to seriously cut back on
non-FF games a while back, plus PE2 salted the earth a bit by steering the plot into a direct ripoff of
the Resident Evil series, thus losing the main appeal of the first game, and they can't really get it
back.

Multiparter

Greetings, googly goog!
I've been a fan of your Q&A column for some time, but I've never written in (mainly because I'm afraid of slimes). I've written to Lord Aegis once, but that's because shields don't have the ability to throw toxic goo. So, uh, anyway.....*cowers in the corner* Here are some questions I have that I'm hoping you could help me with, almighty google...

1) Do you think Kingdom Hearts will be a hit? I'd probably rent it out of curiousity.

Googleshng:
That depends on your definition of hit, but with most, the answer is a decided NO.

2) I'm a big fan of videogame music, so I was wondering, what RPG (in your humble opinion) has the best soundtrack?

Googleshng:
That's a REAL tough one. I'd have to go with the original Phantasy Star followed closely by Xenogears.

3) Why is that ugly black spider on my wall staring at me?

Googleshng:
It's probably just evil incarnate like the 5 on my wall.

4) Do you believe that fish and human beings can co-exist peacefully in the future?

Googleshng:
Not if fish don't quit tasting so darn good.

5) Where's my tilde? I want a tilde!

Anyway, I hope your enjoying the holiday season. Take care, and don't let the moogles fool you into buying Mount Rushmore.

Sincerely,
Mr. Fenrir from the Land of the Lew

Googleshng:
You can't handle the tilde!

Christmas stuff

Greetings (Chu-Chu sings) Googleshng
I wonder what is the best minigame in your opinion? What sort of gifts
did you end up also? What games are you waiting for to come out in 2002?
Where did everyone vanish to?
Imperial Mog

Googleshng:
Hmm... games I want in 2002... I'd have to check schedules for most things, but I believe WarCraft 3,
Eternal Darkness, and Arc are all due out next year, yes?

SMACK!

Greetings Googleshng.

1. Do you have Hoshigami? I got it for Christmas and after the 3rd battle I decided I needed to restart my game. It's quite difficult you see...but maybe I'm not utilising all the abilites I could be.

How do sessions work and what are they for?

2. Are the Harry Potter games and movie supposed to be entitled "The Sorcerer's stone" or "The Philosopher's stone"? One seems to be US only...

A is your active character, E is the enemy who's about to go on a little trip, and the arrows are your
other characters, on standby, facing in those directions. Now you just have A attack, hit triangle when
the bar comes up, and when it's in the highlighted bit in the middle, hit X, and watch the baddie bounce.
Works with an empty space between the baddie and the first standby character too.

The more enemies you kill with sessions, and the longer those sessions are, the more/better loot you get
at the end of the fight.

Some other quick advice for Hoshigami: Memorize the relationships of all the deities so you know how
to gain DP and have spells hurt, and remember that character building hurts you if you do it a little,
but helps you if you do it a lot.

Oh, and as for your other question, anything based on the first Harry Potter book should say Sorcerer's,
but the book itself should have said Philosopher's traditionally. Go figure.

Attack of the Tomms.

Hey Goog, no mail, eh? Here's a few Qs

1) What did you get for Xmas?

Googleshng:
In my mailbox right now, there are letters from a RealTomm, a FakeTomm, a Tomm, and someone I know who's
actual name is Tomm but he doesn't sign letters that way, and they all use the same ISP. Freaky.

Anyway, as for what I got for Christmas, well, since half my mailbox is asking, next to nothing. I got
a meager amount of cash which I intend to blow later today on a couple used games, and a rather spiffy
Wolfwood action figure. Come to think of it, it cost me more to ship my cousin's present to him than
any one person spent on me. I'd probably gripe about how poor my whole family is if I didn't have
Thor there
for comparison... hope he gets the last bit of cash he's looking for soon, on behalf of all the People
With Inexplicably Popular Personal Pages, this whole somberness deal is really cramping our style.

2) When does Dragon Warrior IV come out?

Googleshng:
Hmm... not soon enough for me to give you a solid date.

3) Have you had a chance to play Shadow Hearts? Is it worth getting?

Googleshng:
I haven't had a chance to yet no, but it's the first game I plan to get for the PS2 should I ever find
someone willing to, say, sell me a used PS2 for dirt cheap.

4) Have you see LotR, yet? It's my favorite movie ever; can't wait for Two
Towers!

-Tomm

Googleshng:
As mentioned before, 'twas spiffy. I have to wonder why they're spacingthem a full year apart if they're
all in the can already though.

Characters by Nob

Heya Google,
Is Van from Chrono Cross male or female? I tried using your chin rule but I still can't tell. Also, does Gilder from SoA remind you of Dryden from Escaflowne?

Googleshng:
Van is male, and yes, Gilder DOES look like Dryden. For that matter, Dryden is a dead ringer for Citan,
and Citan looks quite a bit like Egon from Ghostbusters.

Quickies

Why oh why, Goog?!

Chris

Why ask why? Drink some chai!

The Last Laugh:

Well, that's that. This week was annoyingly short. CC will be back from limbo tomorrow, so it'll be his
turn to say "Ahhhh... good to be back!"

One last thing before I go though. Since a good number of people asked last weekend, here's how the whole
games-for-guest-hosting chain works again:
Reader A is guest hosting. He has a list of obscure games he's never been able to find. Reader B sends
one of those games to reader A. Reader B now gets to guest host for up to 3 weeks, and list off HIS list
of obscure games. Reader C sends him one of those, and the whole thing continues that way. I think I'm
on reader Y or so by now, so it's a pretty stable system. The current list of requested games is:
Either of the Sega-CD Lunar games
Phantasy Star 3 and 4
Dragon Force